One Candle, One Cake
by candelight
Summary: Turtle Tot. Sometimes, that's all it takes.


One Candle, One Cake

Turtle Tot. Sometimes, that's all it takes.

~(*0*)~

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><p>Dripping with so much sap you might as well grab your pancakes. Nonetheless, hope you enjoy.<p>

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><p>There are a great number of things that aren't easy in life. Fortunately and unfortunately for Hamato Raphael, he knows this all too well.<p>

It seems to him that the only way to earn _anything _halfway decent in life, is to usually do things that _aren't _easy in the slightest. And he is right, dear reader, he is right.

Losing his temper is admittedly a very easy thing for him to do-and he usually gets sent to his "Quiet Corner" because of it. Needless to say, he's not particularly fond of the Quiet Corner because he's forced to: A, Sit Still, B, Not say or do anything at all, and C, (Worst of all) Be subject to Mikey's taunts while he's trying in vain to find his "happy place."

_Keeping_ his temper is a very difficult task for him, and there's so much _work_ involved that he often forgets or ignores the consequences of losing it-whether they involve the Quiet Corner, a firm reprimand from his father, or his brothers alienating him from their play.

He knows well enough by now that regret is an ugly feeling, but Raph has never been quite good at planning for the future.

But when _he_ is able to keep a lid on his boiling temper, even if it's only by the last waning threads of his patience, Master Splinter usually notices and grants him one of his approving smiles.

Those approving glances are normally directed in Leo's direction during ninjitsu-and that's yet another source of difficulty for Raphael. When he struggles in class to earn Splinter's attention using sheer blunt force, he scarcely gets it, much to his confusion and resentment. He might pound a punching bag as if it owed him money, and his teacher might only give him the slightest of nods before moving on.

However, when Splinter notices that Raph's fists are curled, his face is set into an angry scowl, and he's COUNTING rather than chasing his brothers down and taking out all of his aggression on them, the rat clasps him by the shoulder, gently moves him aside, and grants him one of those smiles that never cease to make Raph feel just a little bit more at ease.

Just a little bit, mind you.

Those are the kind of smiles Raph can't help but adore. Don't get him wrong; he's not gonna become a major teacher's pet like Leo, but he loves the feeling of his sensei's approval all the same. He doesn't quite understand it, but he supposes that trying to understand why he sort-of-kind-of-maybe-understands while he _doesn't _understand might just leave him with yet another difficult problem: A headache.

However, he's not going to agonize over it-let Mikey be the one who gets blue in the face when he tries to think.

~(*0*)~

There are certainly many other things in life that certainly aren't easy for Raphael. Standing outside the bathroom pouting while Master Splinter sternly calls, "Now Raphael, it is YOUR turn," is not a pleasant thing, particularly when he _knows _the water's cold and he's going to be reminded to scrub behind the ears. He's _way_ too old to be told that, even if he happens to forget to wash there most of the time.

Sewer life notwithstanding, he wishes Splinter were not such a neat freak.

Having Donny already watching a dumb scientific special when he wants to watch boxing isn't easy, especially when the people on their secondhand TV are blah-blah-blahing something that doesn't even sound like crude English. Don's wary to his tricks when it comes to swiping the remote, and usually hides it beforehand, much to his agitation.

What's worse is that there's usually nothing else to _do _when he wants to watch TV and can't. Master Splinter reminds him that he can always tidy up the lair if he needs something to keep him occupied, but Sensei doesn't understand the point. So, if his brothers are busy and don't wanna play with him, and Splinter's meditating or contemplating a Soap Opera's Digest, it's usually time to wander the sewers until he discovers some new treasure or a quiet place where difficult hours become (grudgingly, it seems) not quite so bad.

~(*0*)~

Tripping over Mikey's toys is decidedly an easy thing, though it obviously results in his bruising and a bump on the head. Having to share a room with his brothers is also not a very easy thing; Mikey talks in his sleep, Don asks for boring bedtime stories that put his brothers to sleep almost at once, and he and Leo are always quarreling about space. When he wants to kick the shell out of his old punching bag, it seems like Leo deliberately decides to meditate. And Splinter was more likely to tell Raph to simply _use their training alcove _than to tell Leo to buzz off. The injustice is infuriating.

However, though you'd have to torture Raph (or tickle him excessively) to hear it, it's not really so bad. When everyone's still and breathing peacefully around him when he wakes up in a cold sweat after a nightmare, the room feels safer. _Kinder_, somehow, in the dark. If worst comes to worst and he still can't sleep, he can always slip in beside one of his brothers. Leo won't rat him out, Don sleeps like a dead guy, and Mikey has crawled in beside one of his brothers after a night terror more times than Raph can count on his fingers. (Which admittedly might not be saying much, but still.) The company usually helps him wander back to sleep.

Still, there are few things that can't solve this particular difficulty like Splinter's own warm hand and lap while the rat reads or does the crossword. Dreamless sleep normally creeps in before Splinter's halfway done doing the "Across" section.

~(*0*)~

Easily, one of the hardest things he's ever had to endure is hunger. While he and his family scour for supplies on a daily basis, sometimes, there simply isn't much to salvage. At least, not food that his dad calls "safe" for them to eat. But when your stomach is hurting and you haven't eaten anything other than a fourth of a can of beans that day, _anything_ looks good. Splinter usually tries to make up for it by pouring his sons ample amounts of tea, but there's really only such the stuff can do, especially when you have to listen to your stomach growl again shortly afterwards, or Mikey murmur aloud the menu of a local Chinese take-out place at night.

When their food storage is low and the amount of food coming in is miniscule, the Hamato household often becomes a gloomy, dispirited place. Raph says and does things he does not mean to, and often is left alone in his room after suffering the consequences, face buried in a warm, damp pillow.

What's also extremely difficult for Raphael? Hearing his father lie to him, when he insists on a daily basis just how _important _and _pure_ the truth is. Thankfully, he hasn't heard Master Splinter lie to his face for a very, very long time now, and he hopes it'll never, ever happen again.

He said that he _was_ eating. A fair amount. Splinter had even prepared his own bowl and filled it to appease the suspicious turtle.

But he'd peeked behind the archway after he'd "left" and watched his father start spooning our the contents of his own bowl, redistributing the meager portions to the turtles' plates.

It had taken a long time for Raph for forgive him for that one.

~(*0*)~

There's another trial that comes along every spring, when he and his family sort of kind of celebrate their "birthdays." After watching a number of cartoons and reading a number of silly books, Mikey had begged Master Splinter for a birthday. Raph was sorely disappointed when Master Splinter actually _agreed. _

Splinter didn't even know his own birthday, and he has no clue what day Raph and his brothers might be. All Splinter is sure of is that he and the turtles first met in the spring, perhaps around May.

It's not a huge hullabaloo or anything; Splinter might scrimp and save for awhile once it started getting warmer in the sewer tunnels, and one random day, without any warning, Raph might wake up to his "birthday," which usually meant cookies. One year, there'd even been a cake for all of them. Maybe a few small gifts from Splinter. Because he and his brothers never knew exactly when they might have a birthday, they tended to look for hopeful items earlier in the year and keep them hidden in the sewers, sometimes for months on end.

While the day is usually a nice one, a secret wish of Raph's is...well, uh...

Well, too bad. You ain't going to hear what or why. It'd be too _difficult_ for your tiny brain to try and process.

~(*0*)~

He has never told Master Splinter anything. Never fussed, never once complained about sharing his birthday with four other people. (The story Donny had dug out about quintuplets had failed to make him feel very better.) Never let on a single thing.

Or so he thought. Or maybe it's sheer coincidence. He has no idea.

Still, it's obvious that his family's been planning this for a long while now when he wakes up one morning, surrounded by his snickering brothers and his smiling father, faces lit up in the dark room by the glow of one candle stuck in a small cupcake held before him.

It's puny. It's laughable. He insists to this day that he never once needed _anything _like this sissiness-the attention, the lousy singing from his brothers that might as well been the screeching of tortured bats, the arguing-"Open mine first!" "No, mine!" "You're going to _love _mine!"

Still, while he only shakes his head and smirks at his family while they frog-march him to the breakfast table for his favorite meal (cold cereal), he can't help but feel like a king as he blows out the first candle meant entirely for him, and makes a wish.

And that sort of feeling was the easiest in the world to hang onto that day.


End file.
